Investigate-gate, George Will, Oct 11^th

George Will tells us that in his opinion the head of the IRS should be impeached. The IRS has, in the past, been accused of unfairly targeting right wing groups over their tax status. Now it seems that additional sins have been discovered. The problem is one of long standing and George Will believes it now merits outrage because of the recently unearthed email accounts attributable to Ms. Lerner. According to Mr. Will and other likeminded defenders of conservative fundraising organizations, these emails show the IRS director was guilty of malfeasance in office and should be expelled forthwith. Democrats are not so sure. “So, Ms. Lerner’s husband voted for a socialist, she is a Democrat, she supports same-sex marriage, and she apparently doesn’t have a lot of Republican supporters among her family or friends,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (Ore.), the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee. “What is all of this supposed to prove?” It proves that the Republicans would much rather investigate than even try to legislate. Investigation requires only a simple majority on a Congressional Committee, legislation requires compromise, and compromise is impossible for Republicans even among themselves let alone between themselves and Democrats.

 The Republicans aren’t having much luck with their investigating committees lately. Kevin McCarthy, was a likely successful candidate for Speaker of the House, third in line for the Presidency, until he suggested that the incessant hammering by the Benghazi investigating committee began to sabotage Secretary Clinton’s popularity. He was implying that the Benghazi Committee had just that outcome as one of its goals. Imagine a Republican investigating committee trying to sabotage a Democratic Presidential candidate’s chances. That gaffe was a splendid gift to the Clinton campaign. But there’s more! One of the committee investigators was fired and he claims his firing was because he was not sufficiently negative about Secretary Clintons Benghazi activities. The committee has denied the charge and claims the firing was because the investigator was just too hard on the Secretary Clinton. Imagine that, no I can’t either!

Now the Republicans are having trouble finding someone to be Speaker of the House. To get some idea of just how bizarre this has become one pundit suggested, that because you needn’t be elected to the house to be Speaker of the House the Republicans should invite Donald Trump to take the job. It would never work because Trump is too smart to accept it. The embarrassment for the Republicans is that neither Republican faction can do anything at all without Democratic votes. Imagine the Republicans not being to elect a Speaker without the help of the Democrats.